


Washed Clean

by glacis



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-13
Updated: 2009-11-13
Packaged: 2017-10-02 14:20:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glacis/pseuds/glacis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What life without a reset button might be like for Angel et al. Caveat lector.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Washed Clean

Washed Clean, an Angel story by glacis. Rated R for violence. Caveat lector.

~K~

Washed away. Everything Kate had ever wanted in her life, everything she was, washed away in the disbelief in their eyes. The false sympathy in that woman's voice. The arrogant disappointment in Lou's eyes. In big brown eyes that said they cared but learned to live with all kinds of things. Washed away with the sting of vodka and the chalky taste of pills on her teeth. In the grinding slivers of ice in the pit of her stomach. She felt cold.

He'd feel bad. Maybe. But she wouldn't have to feel anything. Ever again. It was better that way. Wasn't it?

She couldn't feel her fingers. Couldn't feel her lips. Didn't notice when he cut her off, because the telephone was lying next to her shoulder and her eyes were closed. She fucking hated to cry. Crying made you weak and she wasn't weak.

She was just numb.

~L~

Darla didn't think he knew what she did when he took his shower after he got home from the Firm. As he stood under the steaming needles of water and scrubbed until his skin was raw. Until the scars on his stump were bright and angrily red. Until he couldn't tell the water from the tears.

Of course he knew.

He really wasn't as stupid as she thought he was. Although he was as devoted. Lindsey didn't know why he did the things he did anymore. He'd had a plan. Once. It made sense. Once. He was going places.

Once.

Now he was just going to Hell, a fact he'd known in the abstract for quite some time and in the concrete since making the acquaintance of Angel and falling in love. With Angel's sire.

With Angel.

With all the possibilities he'd given up when he'd signed his soul away, not once, but twice.

He hadn't realized she was actually at the raising of the Senior Partner until Angel unmasked her. He should have, of course. Who else would wear crimson satin at a law firm gathering where people were trying their damnedest to be as invisible as possible? When the guard told Mr. Hart there was a vampire on the premises, Lindsey's heart had skipped a beat. Not sure who he'd thought it would be, Darla or Angel.

Not sure who he'd hoped it would be.

Shocked the shit out of him when it was both.

Lilah brought him in. Of course. Stupid cunt. Let him in and let him attack Darla, then had the balls to tell the goons to stake her. It had felt good slapping her mouth. He'd even used his real hand, so he could feel it. Used his real fist on the guards, too, then pulled Darla to her feet and got her out the door. Couldn't read the look on her face as she stared at him. Apology? Shock? The tiniest hint of guilt?

Nah. Probably just trying to think of something to say that would keep him at her side. She should know by now. She didn't have to say a thing.

He wasn't going anywhere.

He turned at the sound of shattering glass, bypassing Lilah's glare to stare at the Angel- and senior partner-shaped hole in the window. Another one bites the pavement. Ashes to ashes. Dust to pavement paste.

Wondering for the thousandth time why it didn't bother him any more than it did to know that once again he'd fucked his career all to hell and back, shrugging it aside as unimportant for the thousand and first time, Lindsey brushed his hair away from his face and stepped back into the room. Back into chaos. He'd think of something to say. Some way to make it work. He always did.

Business as usual. Filth up to his eyeballs and him wallowing like a pig in a sty right smack in the middle of it. And she wondered why he could never get clean.

~G~

He'd been on the streets since he was a kid. Knew them like the back of his hand. Better. Knew them for the battlefield they were, and the home, too. Knew how dangerous it got and the brotherhood that survived there.

How'd they think he could've forgotten that? It was in his blood. It was who he was. Gunn had fought and lived and killed the thing that his sister had become on these streets. His blood and all it meant to him was in, and on, these streets.

Streets that didn't want him anymore.

He was living on borrowed time, he knew that. Living on favors owed from a past he was losing every day he spent in that little rat hole with the white guy and the princess. Gunn knew they were more than that. To him.

That was the problem.

He didn't belong to them, either. They belonged to him, much as he'd let them. Wes had been damn fool stupid and got himself shot, and Gunn had taken care of him, 'cause that was what you did for a brother. But he was the only one who knew that Wes was his brother.

His brothers from before, from the hood, from the streets, they just saw another white guy. Saw another brother turning his back on the street and going over to the enemy. Started with Angel, and got all twisted and strange and wrong. At the same time, something right. They would watch his back, the princess and Wes. They would call him if they needed him.

Time was he didn't have to be called. Time was when he knew. Time was when he was there already, protecting, fighting, doing what had to be done. Now he had to be called.

The streets didn't say a thing. They wouldn't call. Wasn't his streets anymore.

He didn't belong on the side of the Angels, 'cause the angels didn't live there any more. Didn't belong in that fight, neither.

Didn't belong anywhere.

~W~

Wesley had become quite adept at reading subtext in his relatively short and quite varied life. So it came as a surprise when it took a literal spilling of the guts to provoke a metaphorical one.

Life was inevitably circular, regardless of one's best intentions. He'd put his trust in paternal figures, leadership figures, three times in his life. The first, his father, he had never satisfied and never would. That wound burned, but only late at night when his defenses were lowest, or when snotty, small-minded demons taunted him with it. The second, a Watcher with a greater reputation as a rogue than Wesley ever would attain, thought him a nonentity. Compared him, unfavorably, with a blueberry scone, before turning away from him and ignoring him completely.

Especially disconcerting considering Wesley had never seen a blueberry scone in his life. He wasn't certain such a thing existed.

The third had been his grail, his final hope. His Waterloo. A souled vampire who was fighting for redemption with every fibre of his being. Who could accept and understand a rogue slayer, forgive her the torments she visited upon her ex-Watcher, for she was worthy of redemption as well, was she not?

Well, wasn't he?

Wesley probed at the thought like a tongue worrying a sore tooth. Virginia hadn't thought so, not in the end. At the end she was reduced to a vague pity, a desire not to wound him further than he already was. It was left to him to say the words, to sever the cord. Left to him to allow her to leave him.

Alone.

Cordelia was undoubtedly right. He didn't count. Not to his family, birth, professional or adopted. Not to the good fight, a fight that seemed to have lost its proponents at an alarming rate. He had to believe it would get better. Had to hold on to the optimism that had enabled him to survive so far. Had to know in his heart of hearts that he did matter and that he would not always be alone. Even in his head, he sounded like he was protesting too much.

It echoed.

~C~

They were going to pay! Yes! For the first time since that society bitch had taken her now-only-two-eyed little girl and waltzed out the door after screwing them royally, Cordelia felt like dancing. Okay, so getting cornered at the bookcase by feral Angel with iceman eyes hadn't made her day any better. And seeing Wesley with his stitches popped had certainly been something she could just as well have missed. But there were few things that a healthy pay check couldn't fix.

Or at least make better.

Because with a paying client came paid bills. Lights that actually turned on when you flipped the switch. Water that ran out of the faucet. Heat when it got late and the air conditioner when it got hot. Gas to put in the motorcycle. A trip to the thrift shop for something she could pretend was chic.

No cockroaches.

Money didn't make everything alright, but it made everything one hell of a lot easier to take. Like loneliness. And betrayal. And failure.

All the things that made life in LA such a great time for all concerned. Especially women who'd been raised to expect better than a life as a second-rate prophet for a do-gooder who didn't want to do good anymore, who didn't have friends, didn't have any open credit on any of her maxed cards, was just about past the point of dreams, and didn't really expect anything more. Not anymore.

Cordelia sighed and headed into the traffic. Just another hour, please god. Just another hour and it would all be a little bit better. She'd take every little bit she could.

With both hands.

~A~

It was a mind game. He knew that even as the elevator doors opened. Even as he asked the question he knew he should never, ever ask a lawyer. Even a dead one. Maybe especially a dead one.

Why?

He'd felt the heat of battle in his veins as he went after Darla. As he uncorked the holy water and snatched off her wig, Angel had felt a fire run through him. Almost holy in itself. It was the beginning of the grand finale. He'd take the gauntlet. Kill the senior partner. Go to Hell and finally make an end to it.

The fight was good. Lindsey got her out of the way, no doubt, because that was what Lindsey was there for, but Angel didn't see it, because by that time he had the senior partner by the throat, and it was exploding into dust and bugs, and he was falling fifteen floors to impact with the concrete. The ring was there, battle was good, he was ready to roll.

Then Holland started to talk.

Even worse, Angel started to listen.

Oh, he tried not to, of course. But Holland was good, even dead. He'd talked, and it hadn't made any sense, so Angel'd had to ask a question. Bad move. By the time the doors opened, Hell on Earth was literal and his mind felt like a pretzel. Baked hard. Ready to shatter.

During the long walk home all he saw was what Holland had told him he would see. Hate. Rage. Pettiness. Stupidity. Greed. Evil. Everywhere. He didn't see the good he'd fought so long to save. Didn't recognize it when he did see it.

All he could hear in Kate's voice on the answering machine was blame. It couldn't just be his. It was hers, too. He couldn't feel bad, like she said he should.

He couldn't feel anything.

Then there was Darla, and he still couldn't feel anything. He tried anger. Tried to throw her around, toss her through a window, slam her up against the wall. Nothing. Kissed her, licked the blood from her lip, tangled his hands in her hair. Still, nothing. Ripped her clothes from her body, threw her on the bed, thrust into her until they both cried out and went still.

All he wanted was to feel something besides the cold. Couldn't she feel the cold? The cold of his skin against the cold of hers. Dead things. Cold things. The ice in the passion in the love in the hatred between them.

Maybe he should've fucked Lindsey. At least the little bastard would've been warm.

He felt like he should have felt his soul come out of his body when he came in her. When she came around him. He didn't feel anything but the cold. He smiled at her because she seemed to expect it. Then he rolled off her, and she turned away, and he closed his eyes because he couldn't look at the ceiling any more and she was too far away. Still cold.

Angel came awake with a start. The pain, the numbness, the anguish at the evil all around him and the helplessness he'd felt all too often in his useless quest for redemption were all gone. Washed away.

~K~

Washed clean.

The paramedics shook their heads at the waste. "Pretty woman like that. Looks like somebody trashed the place, too. Musta been a helluva fight with her boyfriend."

The beat cops knew who she was, and weren't surprised or impressed. "She was a weird one. Whattaya expect, from a Mulder wannabe?" the one groused to his partner, who nodded agreement. "She was in the twilight zone too long, crazy bitch."

Lou closed the folder on the report, doubly glad her dad wasn't alive to see it. "Hell of an end for the girl to come to."

Nobody at the station noticed.

~L~

"You did say our sole special project was to subvert Angel," Lindsey purred.

Lilah glared daggers at him. He ignored her and continued. "What do you suppose he's doing right now?"

Hart stared through him as well, and Lindsey swallowed hard. This was hard to say for so many reasons. He was glad there wasn't a mind reader in the room. He didn't want to admit even to himself which he was more jealous of, Darla or Angel.

"Having sex. With Darla." He forced a smirk at Lilah. "You didn't really think I was saving her for myself, did you?"

She had no answer to give him. Hart looked thoughtful. Lindsey concentrated on breathing regularly and keeping his voice steady.

"Once he loses his soul, once he's Angelus again, we will have what we wanted. Angel on our side during the coming apocalypse. In order to attain a positive outcome there had to be certain sacrifices." That was one way to put losing a senior partner. "For the greater good of the Firm." Dirty was bad. Dead was worse. He'd take the former over the latter.

After a subjective million-year pause, Hart smiled and nodded. "In the larger scheme of things, a good choice."

He turned and stalked out the door, waving at minions to clean up the mess made by the recent demise of the senior partner. Lilah snarled soundlessly. Lindsey had won.

This round.

~G~

The streets felt colder and emptier than usual. It should've made him hyper. Every footstep should've rang like thunder. Gunn was just thinking he'd lost his edge when the pop came from behind him.

Little pop. Nothing much, just a little pop.

Fast when a head explodes like that.

Some favors come back to haunt a man faster than others. Some brothers don't like it when a man goes over to the enemy.

~W~

Clutching the pillow close to his chest, Wesley was well aware that there was something wrong. His abdomen felt warm and swollen. His legs felt heavy. His head ached. He looked down and saw purple patches, blood under the skin where there shouldn't be any blood.

He wasn't a fool. He knew a hemorrhage when he saw one.

He couldn't call Cordelia. He'd tried that. He wouldn't call Virginia. He'd allowed her to walk away and it wouldn't be fair to call her back now simply because he needed her. He shouldn't call Angel. Angel wouldn't answer.

By the time dawn crept through the half-closed draperies, it didn't matter any more.

~C~

"We are quite pleased to see you, my dear."

Great. Creepy looking dead pasty guys. And no check. Cordelia tried to run.

Big creepy looking dead pasty guys who moved really fast and were stronger than they looked. She tried to kick. Bit one and spit hard. He tasted terrible.

"You have been bad for business," he scolded her. "Angel Investigations must cease to be."

"We're not Angel Investigations any more!" she shrieked, angry beyond thought. "Angel isn't part of it! He's history!"

Okay, maybe that had been a stupid thing to admit. They looked way too happy to hear her say it. One of them stroked her hair, a bizarrely gentle touch in the instant before he grabbed her chin in his other hand and twisted.

There was no time to think before there was nothing at all.

~A~

Once he got his breathing under control and ignored the impression that his heart was pounding, because his heart hadn't beat much less pounded in two hundred and fifty years, Angel was bemused to realize he had no desire to wreak mayhem on anyone.

There was the vague thought that the sex hadn't been as good as he remembered. A rumbling in his stomach that bespoke a case of the munchies. An itch at the base of his shoulder blade that assured him that he did, indeed, still have his soul. He glanced over at Darla, still sleeping like the dead she was at his side.

Guess it hadn't been unmitigated bliss after all. Maybe it was because she was as far from virgin as it was possible to be so that purity factor wasn't there. Maybe it was all the water under the bridge between them. Maybe it was because he hated her almost as much as he loved her. Hell, maybe it was just 'cause the sex hadn't been that great.

Whatever it was, he felt better than he had in a long time. Maybe he'd just had to get laid to get over his latest crisis of faith. He leaned a shoulder against the headboard and idly played with the edge of the sheet. He'd been a shit lately. Really had to do something about that. He grimaced at the material bunched between his fingers.

Apologizing wasn't his strong suit, but he could manage it when he had to, and considering how he'd been treating his friends lately, he did have to if they were ever going to speak to him again. And he'd missed them. All of them. Even Cordelia. Yelling at him.

Reaching for the wooden pike he kept at the side of the bed, he grasped Darla's shoulder and rolled her over onto her back. Her eyes had barely opened when he drove the pike through her heart. She made no sound as she dissipated into dust.

Hadn't been as hard as he'd thought it would be. Now that it was over, he felt free. Back on the road to redemption. Unburdened by the past. Ready for breakfast. And after breakfast, he'd call up Cordy and get back in the gang's good graces. Maybe even call up Kate. In the clear light of morning, carefully indirect, he did feel bad about what she was going through. What he'd put them all through. He'd make his amends. After breakfast.

There was time.

the end

in their own words (except Wes; as usual someone else must speak for him)

Kate : I won't feel anything.

Lindsey : I'm always dirty.

Gunn : Let me know if you need me.

Wes : You don't count (from Cordelia).

Cordelia : For that I'd have to have friends. Which I don't.

Angel : Can't you feel the cold?


End file.
